Mini Bio

I’m 38. I live on the outskirts of a small Montana town — one that has three stop signs, two bars, a blacksmith, and no grocery store. Sharing the hovel I call home is my husband, Brian, and our dogs, Levee and Wicket.

What’s a Suzzerpuss?

I have no idea.

My grandfather (Pappy) called my sister and I Ralph, Clyde, or Charlie, depending on the day. My grandmother (Nanny) called us both Suzzerpuss.

When I told her that I’d picked Suzzerpuss for a webpage name, she asked me what a Suzzerpuss was. So, I guess no one knows.

Stand up When You Hear Your Name

April 1, 2015/

Right now our new friend seems to respond to tongue clicking, the rattling of the food bag, and “Hey, good boy!” I couldn’t very well refer to him as SHUSH-SHUSH-SHUSH here, and I didn’t want him to get accustomed to Good Boy as his name either since there are quite a few wild cats around, and if another happens to start enjoying my company I’ll probably say “Hey, good boy” to him as well. We can’t have everyone thinking their name is Good Boy. This isn’t the Foreman house; everyone here gets their own moniker. So, after nearly three weeks of going back and forth with names, we finally settled on Pickwick. Hopefully he’ll acknowledge it in time. If not, I still have SHUSH-SHUSH-SHUSH to fall back on.

What made you think of Pickwick, you didn’t ask?
Well, let me tell you…

I came across the name while doing research on my genealogy. I resumed working on my family line a few months ago, after pausing for our year without internet in Connecticut. I’m trying to make as many connections as I can on my own. It’s very easy to link the wrong people when 96% of your ancestors are named Mary, so I don’t want to depend on someone else’s research. However, occasionally I run into blocks and grabbing someone else’s tree information helps steer me to the path of making the connection (with sources) on my own.

Unfortunately, the lineage that led to my discovery of a ship christened Pickwick, was not my own. I followed a lead from someone else’s tree and spent an entire evening researching the wrong family history. Luckily, I noticed the error before setting the names into my own family tree. The same can not be said for the fellow whose research I went by.